January 2005 was a profoundly significant month for Russia in many ways,
but above all as the month when our people, after a sleep of many years,
demonstrated their capacity for joint actions in defence of their common
social interests. As many as 300,000 people in more than fifty regions
of Russia came out onto the streets over a four-week period, beginning
with the symbolic date of the anniversary of "Bloody Sunday".
Why did this happen? What was the objective meaning of these events? What
could the left have done, or not done, to assist these mainly spontaneous
initiatives of the population? What lies ahead, and what can and should
be the strategy and tactics for supporters of social renewal? What lessons
should we draw from the first successes and failures?

Any analysis which is made hot on the trail of events has its advantages
(an emotional mood and the energy of social creativity inspire one to
work) and its shortcomings ("Face to face you don't see the face,
the big picture can only be seen at a distance", and direct immersion
in events affects scholarly impartiality to a degree). Nevertheless, we
resolved to take these first steps toward an analysis, and to make these
first generalisations, since Marxists are distinguished by the way they
prefer to act in a conscious, thought-out fashion. In any case, what is
involved here is not subjecting citizens and their organisations to one's
own speculative agendas, but the chance to understand the logic and objective
meaning of events, to understand the subjective factors driving the protests,
in order to help the movement exploit its opportunities as energetically
as possible.

Prehistory

As has been widely reported, the immediate cause of the first protests,
in Moscow province on January 10, was the abolition of free travel for
pensioners on public transport. The real source of these events, however,
lies outside the framework of 2005. The process through which the now-notorious
Law No. 122 on the monetisation of benefits was drafted and prepared for
adoption began a year ago, and was immediately met with an active campaign
of protest. The draft law was criticised on three counts. The first of
these in terms of logic (though not of importance) was the intellectual
critique. Even before the law was adopted, the critically minded section
of the scholarly community (in the research institutes of the Russian
Academy of Sciences, at Moscow State University and in regional centres),
left-wing intellectuals (including our "Alternatives" movement),
a number of professors, independent deputies of the State Duma (O.N. Smolin,
S. Yu. Glazyev, and others) and many other experts warned the community.
These analyses predicted virtually all the problems that have now materialised,
and a number that still await us. Among them are the following:

the general negative effects on the most deprived layers of the population
of abolishing benefits in kind (in a poor country the lack of a guaranteed
minimum, provided in concrete form, leads to the degradation and dying
out of the poorest section of the population, those who are unable to
work or have only limited fitness for work);

the low level of the monetary compensation, which does not satisfy
even the minimal requirements that were covered by the benefits in kind,
along with the delays in payment (in short, the authorities will pay
less than they earlier provided in kind, while not paying it everywhere,
not paying it to everyone and, when they do pay it, paying it after
delays);

the use of the monetisation of benefits as a new step along the road
to the ultimate commercialisation and privatisation of everything that
remains unstolen in our country (in this case, social welfare payments
etc.).

In addition, we pointed out that the abolition of benefits was merely
one element in the antisocial measures inspired by Law No. 122. Still
to come are the commercialisation and privatisation of communal services,
education, science, health care and so forth—that is, the destruction
of the last remnants of social welfare provisions and, in essence, the
rejection of the very notion of the "welfare state" (which is
guaranteed by our constitution, the guarantor of which is the president—who
initiated all the antisocial reforms).

Finally, we have argued, argue now and will continue to argue that these
measures are not simply a chance outburst of "market fundamentalism"
(to use the term coined by George Soros) on the part of the authorities,
but are part (1) of a long-term strategy of the state (that is, above
all of the president, the government and United Russia) and of capital
to carry out the further commercialisation and privatisation of all spheres
of social and economic life, and (2) of a general wave of global neo-liberal
expansion, whose leaders are becoming a new "proto-empire" (consisting
above all of the us, of the organisations such as nato, the WTO and the
IMF that are fused with this super-state and of the largest transnational
corporations).

The second wave of resistance to Law No. 122 has come from the Duma opposition,
represented above all by the Communist Party of the Russian Federation
(KPRF). Moreover, this party and its allies have also taken a series of
steps outside of parliament, conducting a series of street actions during
the summer.

Unfortunately, the level of activism of this largest of opposition organisations
has not corresponded to the size of its formal membership.

In our view, the most interesting formations to move into struggle against
the attacks on the social rights of citizens have been new movements that
have arisen during the past year. Among them is the left-wing political
network, the Left Youth Front, which unites extremely diverse left-wing
youth organisations, from the Trotskyist Socialist Resistance to the pro-Stalinist
Communist Youth Vanguard (AKM), and including both the KPRF-linked Union
of Communist Youth and the academic specialists—remote from the KPRF—of
the Institute for the Study of Globalisation.

Still more significant has been the uniting in a single network of various
social organisations representing those layers of citizens whose interests
are directly affected by Law No. 122. This network includes a broad spectrum
of independent trade unions (air traffic controllers, dockers, the "Defence
of Labour" union and others); of organisations of invalids, Chernobyl
veterans and human rights defenders; and also of women's, youth and many
other organisations and movements (our movement "Alternatives"
is also part of this network). This association, which eventually came
to call itself the Council of Social Solidarity, has initiated a number
of street actions. A June 2004 demonstration in Moscow, attended by Chernobyl
veterans and invalids from many Russian cities, had a particularly broad
impact.

All these actions, whether in the press, on the streets or in the Duma,
nevertheless made only a small impression on Russians, and had little
effect on the adoption of the law, which finally came into force at the
end of last year.

But the situation that arose in January was different.

First, however, a few words about the important historical context of
these events—the centenary of the First Russian Revolution of 1905-1907.

Historical context

It is curious that in Moscow on January 9, literally on the eve of the
first actions of civil disobedience (the blocking of the Leningrad Highway
at Khimki on January 10), we had held a conference devoted to analysing
the reasons for the passivity of Russians and the conditions under which
their civic activism might be awakened. The date of the conference was
specially chosen so as to coincide with the centenary of Bloody Sunday.
On this day—according to the old style—in 1905, more than 100,000
residents of St Petersburg had gathered on the palace square to demand
minimal bourgeois democratic and social reforms. The peaceful demonstration
was fired on, and more than a thousand citizens—workers and members
of the intelligentsia—were killed. The episode became the prologue
to the First Russian Revolution.

Our first surprise was the number of participants in the discussion;
the hall of the Mayakovsky Museum, with seating for 100 people, was full
to overflowing. Our second surprise was the interested, open, agitated
tone of the discussion, which combined analysis and emotion, sharp polemic
and collective reflection. For the first time after a conference we did
not head off to our homes, but set off in a column through the windswept
Moscow streets to the monument on Tverskoy Boulevard to the participants
in the revolutionary struggles of 1905 and 1917.

The analysis came up with a predictable but nevertheless important result:
protests by workers are most probable not in conditions of decline, but
when an economic upsurge coincides with an open attack on the rights of
citizens, when the authorities not only oppress the population, but also
insult them with openly antisocial behaviour and when the lower orders
(we recall Lenin's famous theses) are no longer willing to live in the
old fashion. If the opposition at this moment can summon enough strength
to support the popular actions, and if its strategy and tactics are sufficiently
developed to help prevent these actions from being choked in elemental
discord, if the opposition is capable of diverting this elemental force
from its inevitably disorganised state into the channel represented by
the self-organisation of strategically regulated joint action and if this
opposition makes use of the popularity and trust of the citizens and of
their spontaneous forms of self-organisation, then all the preconditions
are present for a successful offensive (for the other precondition for
success, a crisis of those at the top, see below).

These theses are well known in the left milieu, even if some people
are still unaware of them, while others do their best to "forget"
them. It is, however, another question that has aroused most debate: what
organisations are required for this process, and just what role should
they play? Here there are three contending approaches.

The first hinges on whether there is a need for a vanguard party to head
up and lead the masses. This is an old thesis, but one that is still popular.
The author has more than once written about how and why, in the twenty-first
century, the model of the vanguard party needs to take on a new shape—an
open, working association of activists who work as "progressors"
of the mass movement, but not as its vanguard. Even if we put theory to
one side, the experience of Russia in recent years has shown that firstly,
no such party exists and, secondly, the parties that lay claim to this
role are for the most part either demagogic, with little in the way of
a following, or consist of intriguers seeking to exploit the offensive
by the masses in order to inflate their own popularity through the mass
media.

The second approach is the traditional one of the champions of parliamentary
cretinism, who reduce the entire struggle to preparing the conditions
for founding a new party (a so-called "social" party) capable
at the next elections of surmounting the seven per cent barrier and of
winning seats in the Duma (it is not beside the point to ask: and what
then? The KPRF has a considerable number of Duma seats, and the effect
is virtually nothing). To this group (which was not well represented at
our meeting), the mass movement is no more than a means of establishing
its future parliamentary caucus.

The third approach has been upheld in the spirit of the principles and
forms of the modern anti-globalist movement, with its stress on creating
open operating networks of mass social organisations and movements, playing
a practical part in solidarity organisation and in the holding of protest
actions. The role of the left in this instance is becoming especially
important. It consists both of day-to-day grassroots collaboration with
this self-organisation (while not trying to replace it with "party
building"), and also of providing intellectual expertise, analysis
and helpful advice, along with comparisons with world experience and with
our own experience, and with the lessons of history (here, it is particularly
important to turn to the experience of 1905-1907, experience that could
not be more timely).

In our view the first real protest actions, which began literally the
next day, confirm the correctness of the supporters of the third line.
But more on this later.

Now, briefly, about the relevance of historical experience. The conference
adopted an appeal, distributed the same day on the internet, in which
it was specifically stressed that the Russian demands of 100 years ago
are still current, and that it is essential to join in struggling for
them. This document, which contains long quotes from an appeal of a century
ago, seems to us to be thoroughly symbolic, and we will therefore reproduce
it in full.

Fellow Citizens!

In two weeks' time it will be exactly 100 years since
the day when citizens of Russia came onto the streets to appeal to the
autocratic authorities, demanding a minimum of civil rights and the solving
of social problems. The authorities met them with bullets, sabres and
whips. Thousands were killed or wounded. January 9, 1905, thus became
Bloody Sunday, the beginning of the First Russian Revolution. Now, on
January 9, 2005, we are forced to state that many of the demands of a
hundred years ago remain unmet. Just read these extracts from an appeal
written a century ago:

We, workers and residents of the city of St Petersburg
of various social strata, our wives, children and helpless old parents,
come to you, sir, to seek the truth and to be defended. We have become
impoverished, we are oppressed and burdened with toil beyond our endurance.
We are railed at, we are not recognised as human, we are treated as
slaves who have to bear their bitter fate and keep silent. We have reached
the limit of our patience. For us, the terrible moment has come when
death is better than a continuation of unbearable torments.

Continuing their demands, the citizens insisted above
all on a constituent assembly, as a first step toward bringing the authorities
under the control of the people, and holding honest elections:

Let everyone be equal and free in their electoral rights-and
to this end, let the elections for the Constituent Assembly take place
under conditions of universal, secret and equal voting.

This is our main demand; everything is founded on it.
But one measure alone cannot heal our wounds. Other things too are indispensable:

I. Measures to end the ignorance and lack of rights of
the Russian people.

The immediate freeing and return of all who have
suffered for their political and religious convictions, for strikes
and peasant uprisings.

An immediate guarantee of the freedom and inviolability
of the individual, freedom of speech and of the press, freedom of
assembly, and freedom of conscience in religious matters.

Universal and compulsory popular education at
state expense.

The accountability of ministers before the people,
and guarantees of the rule of law.

Equality before the law for everyone without
exception.

The separation of church and state.

II. Measures to end the impoverishment of the people.

Abolition of indirect taxes, and their replacement
with a direct progressive income tax.

An end to the war, as desired by the people.

III. Measures against the oppression of labour by capital.

Immediate freedom to organise trade unions and
unions of producers and consumers.

An eight-hour working day, with penalty rates
for overtime.

Immediate freedom for labour to struggle against
capital.

Acceptable pay rates immediately.

Immediate and unconditional participation by
representatives of the working classes in preparing a draft law
on state insurance for workers.

The demands for freedom of speech and for access to the
mass media still remain current. We still lack a parliament with effective
powers, and honest elections. We are still working ten and twelve-hour
days. Reasonable wages remain a dream for most workers and rank-and-file
members of the intelligentsia. Workers still lack genuine rights to participate
in managing production and to exercise oversight over businesses.

The present-day Russian authorities:

have abolished the progressive income tax;

have forced through the Duma a labour code that
restores the labour relations of a century ago, including a lack of
rights for workers, and omnipotence for business and the bureaucracy;

have introduced an antisocial package of laws that
replace social benefits with minuscule financial compensation;

are preparing the privatisation and commercialisation
of education, in order to deprive us of the remnants of universal
access to knowledge .

It is not hard to continue this list of measures, which
are returning us to the conditions of a century ago. Now, on January 9,
2005, as we take part in a peaceful procession through the streets of
Moscow, we call on all citizens of Russia not to believe in the "kindly
tsar", and actively to defend their civil and social rights through
solidarity and joint actions, a program of which we are putting forward
for discussion at the Russian social forum in April 2005.

The anatomy of civil disobedience

A brief chronology of the protest actions of early 2005 is contained
in a whole series of internet publications, and in particular, in the
text by Andrey Podrezov published on the site www.alternativy.ru,
which is appended here. Anticipating our analysis, we shall note some
of the most important empirically observed features of these actions.

In the first place, these were acts of civil disobedience (above all,
the blocking of transport arteries).

Secondly (and this is very important), they encompassed practically every
region of Russia. Extending for thousands of kilometres from north to
south, and for more than ten thousand kilometres from west to east, they
became genuine mass civil protest actions. Although each individual demonstration
or action numbered from a few hundred to 10,000 participants, in sum they
represented an all-Russian resistance movement.

Thirdly, these protests became an all-national phenomenon. This was not
only because as many as 300,000 people took part in them (for Russia,
with 150 million people, this is not so many). The actions had an enormous
social resonance. Enjoying the support of the overwhelming majority of
the population, they frightened the authorities both at the centre and
at the local level, and hence received broad coverage in the mass media;
this, in turn, dramatically strengthened their impact. In this connection,
we should not fail to note the telling debates on one of the central television
channels between the well-known Russian poet Dementyev (supporting the
protests) and Vladimir Zhirinovsky [head of the Liberal Democratic Party]
(who, naturally, opposed them). Here, several aspects are immediately
noteworthy. The unpoliticised poet spoke out in support of the social
demands of the citizens; the debates went live to air on one of the central
channels; more than 100,000 people phoned the studio; and finally, more
than three-quarters of them supported Dementyev, defending the protest
actions and calling for the repeal of Law No. 122. Significantly, analogous
positions were also expressed by well-known intellectuals, including many
prominent Russian economists such as Academician D.S. Lvov, Professor
D.E. Sorokin and Professor V.V. Kulikov.

Fourthly, these actions were spontaneous and initiated from below, but
all the opposition social forces quickly came to support them. And here,
almost for the first time in the past ten years in our country, something
very important happened: numerous regional networks of the most diverse
social and political organisations arose (and all-Russian networks are
in the process of arising). The organisations involved have at times differed
fundamentally in their ideological and political positions, but they are
acting together to carry out specific tasks. The activists, in their overwhelming
majority doing genuine work, quickly joined forces to implement the model
suggested by life itself—of open, flexible, coordinated structures,
carrying out the functions of the collaborative self-organisation of citizens.
Although, as always, the leaders who have emerged include people intent
on erecting new political superstructures, life itself has quickly destroyed
any artificial formations, leaving only the genuinely functioning coordinating
networks and teams.

The conflicts and contradictions between the various branches of the
opposition have not disappeared during this process; they have made their
effects felt constantly, seriously impeding practical action. But these
are the realities of political life, which cannot be avoided, although
these problems can and must be minimised. These are some of the features,
noted by many analysts, of these events—events which at the moment
of writing are still going forward.

What are the reasons for such unusual social and political shifts?

These reasons are not straightforward, since the economic and social
rights of our country's citizens are being violated constantly, we would
even say systematically. There was the runaway inflation of the early
1990s, which wiped out savings and cut the real incomes of most citizens
almost in half. Unemployment, the failure to pay wages, the default of
1998—the list of social catastrophes is almost endless. Even in the
last few years, the adoption of the new labour code has been a harsh anti-social
act on the part of the authorities. It cannot be said that these problems
have all failed to arouse protests. There have been protests, but at least
since 1993 these actions have almost all been relatively small, mounted
by opposition political organisations. The main exception has been the
"stop the labour code" campaign, conducted mainly by the independent
trade unions, but this campaign was nowhere near as large or radical as
the actions of the present time. We might surmise that "the cup of
patience has overflowed", and there would be real grounds for such
a conclusion. But this, in our view, is still not the main thing. In the
course of this winter several important factors have come together, the
combining of which has led both to the spontaneous actions and to the
consolidation of the opposition for joint struggle.

We shall begin with something that is well known to leftists, and which
we mentioned earlier. That is the fact that opposition social forces tend
to move into action at times when the economy is growing, and when there
are also attacks on the social and economic rights of citizens. As a precondition
for the rise of protest, this situation is no less important than the
overflowing of the "cup of patience".

Just as important too is the fact that by the beginning of 2005 people
had already lost faith in the opposition (of all varieties) and in the
possibility of gaining anything through parliament or by appealing to
the administration at any level. The majority of citizens no longer had
any confidence in the political parties, in the Duma, or in the regional
and federal executive authorities. Initially, it was as if the president
were put in brackets, as an individual somehow not implicated in Law No.
122, but in the course of the demonstrations people soon began raising
the slogan for the president to resign as well. Spontaneously and subconsciously,
people were ready for civil disobedience. All that was needed was some
flagrant, harsh, cynical act that signified: the authorities are against
you, citizens. This signal was provided by the abolition of free public
transport for elderly people, a move they encountered on the first day
after the Christmas-New Year holidays.

Of crucial importance was the fact that by this time new, active structures
of social and political opposition had begun to take shape. These included
the organisations of left-wing youth, whether part of the Left Youth Front
or outside it, and also the organisations of invalids and Chernobyl veterans,
the independent trade unions, and so forth. These bodies were coordinating
their activity through the sos, the recently formed organising committee
for the Russian Social Forum and so on. Meanwhile the "old"
opposition political organisations such as the KPRF were already, as the
saying has it, "at a broken trough". The earlier forms and methods
of passive parliamentary action had exhausted themselves; the KPRF and
most of its allies were in crisis, and a section of the activists and
leaders of the Communists were ripe for inclusion in extraparliamentary
struggles.

Finally, another positive factor was the confusion, typical in such situations,
displayed by the authorities. The actions of the protesters were meeting
with support from public opinion. Meanwhile, the demonstrations were receiving
relatively wide coverage in the press. The result was that the first protest
actions served as examples for actions in other regions. In St Petersburg,
for example, pensioners followed the lead provided by the residents of
suburban Moscow, blocking Nevsky Prospekt and Sadovaya Street. The authorities
lacked the decisiveness to uphold consistently what was clearly an ill-thought-out
model for imposing the law and, more importantly, could not ensure unity
of action between the federal and regional administrations. In some cases,
the latter accommodated the aggrieved citizens fairly readily, making
a series of concessions, but often the local authorities dealt savagely
with the activists, including elderly people.

It was this combination of factors, diverse in origin but reinforcing
one another, which in our view formed the cause of the active protests
in Russia during January and February 2005.

The January events: early lessons and the future

It is, of course, still too early to speak of definitive lessons of the
campaign of civil disobedience, which is continuing. Only a few rough
initial sketches are possible. Nevertheless, these have their value. Without
pretending to draw any final conclusions, we would like to note the following
important aspects.

In the first place, the conclusions drawn on the basis of the events
on Independence Square in Ukraine have been borne out [see article by
Aleksandr Buzgalin in Links No. 27]. With all due reservations,
it can be stated that in the post-Soviet space, mass protest actions by
citizens, acts of civil disobedience, are a reality.

Secondly, in Russia, unlike the situation in Ukraine, there have
never been any oligarchs or Western patrons behind the actions. The protests
originated from below and have proceeded on the basis of real civil initiatives,
with parties and social organisations merely assisting this process to
the extent of their abilities. Consequently, the citizens of our countries
are capable of independent actions and of popular initiatives. Moreover,
after beginning with narrowly economic demands, these actions have quickly
taken on a political thrust. The resignation of the president and government,
the dissolution of the Duma-these are typical of the demands being put
forward at demonstrations. The spontaneous politicisation has gone even
further than the activists in the social and political bodies imagined
or proposed.

Thirdly, these actions have shown the possibility of new forms of social
and political self-organisation, the need for these new forms and their
potential.

If we look at the experience of Leningrad, which is especially significant
here, we find that the most active social force helping to organise the
protests was not any of the parties but the Committee of United Action,
a network coordinating structure that included various social and political
organisations. This body also helped conduct the process of negotiating
with the authorities, and provided informational support and so on to
the initially spontaneous protests. Activists in this committee were at
the centre of the struggle, taking on the main weight of the organising
work; accordingly, the repression by the authorities was concentrated
on them. Showing its openness and capacity for dialogue with other organisations
which earlier had not been part of it, this network became the basis for
the civil disobedience network that appeared in St Petersburg.

It is Not Only about the Law on Monetisation
of Benefits

The protest actions, although they had a direct cause in the notorious
Law No. 122 on the monetisation of benefits, were not by any means provoked
solely by this legislation. They are associated with years of accumulating
social tension. Our Russian authorities have dispensed both causes and
occasions for the growth of this tension with an exceedingly generous
hand.

Only recently three desperate invalid miners spent several days picketing
the organisation Sotsugol, which is responsible for providing miners with
social support. They were backed by more than 2500 other invalid pensioners
from the coal sector who for more than two years have not received free
coal to heat their homes (if paid for, this coal would cost more than
six months of their pensions). They had only recently managed to force
the payment of their delayed pensions and benefits, after twice blocking
the access roads to the mine.

Unfortunately, the delays in providing coal for domestic needs, in paying
wages and in making social benefit payments to invalid miners in Rostov
province are by no means an isolated instance. In recent years such problems
have appeared constantly, arising from almost any cause, from heating
shut-downs in winter to the mass cutting off of social benefits. In all
of these cases, the state authorities try to avoid addressing the problems
of providing social welfare to the vulnerable sections of the population—that
is, meeting the obligations laid on them by the constitution and by federal
laws.

Cases in which the authorities simply sabotage the carrying out of the
laws they themselves have adopted, and refuse to force private entrepreneurs
to obey these laws, have become typical. Not even through court suits
is it possible to win the restitution of one's rights, since refined legal
chicanery is used to thwart the requirements of the law. In addition,
people engaged in struggle for their legal rights are themselves subject
to prosecution! Even if the courts recognise the legality of popular demands,
court decisions are often ignored in the most unpardonable fashion, proving
just how valuable the law really is in the eyes of the Russian state.

People are being confronted with glaring evidence that it is practically
impossible for them to force the restoration of their violated rights
through legal methods. You might, after a lengthy ordeal, get a court
to acknowledge that you are in the right. But the decisions of the court
will not be put into effect. What is a citizen to do then? Initiate a
new cycle of legal processes, suing the authorities for failing to implement
a court decision? And how long will all this last? Until the life of the
invalid pensioner, who without desiring it has been turned by state authorities
into a perpetual litigant, draws to a close?

The recent wave of protests by pensioners against Law No. 122 was provoked
by this very contempt for the legal rights of citizens. After all, benefits
in kind were granted to many categories of citizens because their money
incomes did not guarantee, and do not now guarantee, the satisfaction
of their urgent vital needs (for example, for medicines, transport, heating
and so forth). These benefits have been replaced with money payments which,
for most of the people involved, do not provide full compensation for
what they have lost. Protest actions were occurring when this law was
still at the drafting stage. The authorities, however, set out to force
the law through as rapidly as possible, in order to present people with
an accomplished fact. No account was taken even of the people who had
no quarrel with the content of the law, but who merely pointed out that
no proper consideration had been given to practical measures for implementing
it. So what has the result been? When this disgraceful law went into force
at the beginning of the year, its implementation was thwarted. People
were literally forced out into protest actions. It was only when these
protests took on an all-Russian scope that the authorities, to the accompaniment
of verbiage about "behind- the-scenes" forces inciting pensioners
to attend demonstrations and block highways, began taking measures to
put the law into effect.

All this makes it glaringly plain that the authorities do not serve the
interests of the majority of the population, and that they only start
paying a certain attention to people's real needs when they are confronted
with mass acts of civil disobedience.

When it becomes necessary to defend the interests of moneybags- entrepreneurs
against the anger of workers, the authorities immediately find all the
resources needed, even an excess of them. Without paying the least attention
to the law, they launch court prosecutions against people taking part
in struggles for their rights, as well as unleashing the police, the OMON
riot squads, and even special detachments for putting down prison uprisings,
as happened during the notorious events in the Vyborg TSBK. People who
are supposed to defend the law fired on unarmed workers who were not breaking
the law, since the situation surrounding the production combine was not
yet the subject of a judicial ruling.

For long years our authorities were under illusions about the long-suffering
nature of Russian citizens, and to this day they continue to put their
hopes in this patience, testing the people's endurance. Having made insignificant
concessions under the pressure of the pensioners, the authorities are
continuing their experiments, with an offensive against the rights of
the majority. Next in line are equally antisocial reforms in the areas
of communal services, education and health care. But if the authorities
have decided not to take into account the risk of increasing social tensions,
they have to be ready to accept all the consequences that flow from this
policy. If the people are denied all other possibilities for defending
their interests except direct resistance to the authorities, such resistance
will sooner or later become a reality—and no longer just on a local
scale, or in response to local causes.

Appendix : Protest actions in 2005: a brief chronology

The protest actions now taking place throughout the country are some
of the largest to have occurred during the administration of Vladimir
Putin. These protests are not only remarkable for their scale. For the
first time, the protest movement has encompassed more than seventy regions
of Russia, with protests occurring in more than 120 populated centres.
Typically, parties and movements from the most diverse ends of the political
spectrum have joined in supporting the protest actions, from nationalists
to parties of liberal orientation. In St Petersburg, for example, members
of the KPRF, the Russian Communist Workers Party, the Social Democrats,
various communist youth organisations and young people from the Yabloko
party have joined with intellectuals from the Alternatives movement, soldiers'
mothers, members of the independent trade unions and many others. For
the first time, the regional and local authorities have made a few concessions
to the people. Finally, along with economic demands (as well as the restoring
of benefits, these have included raising pensions and wages and abandoning
the Fursenko education reforms), the protests have also been marked by
demands for the resignation of the legislative and executive authorities.
For the first time since 2000, we have witnessed mass demands for the
resignation of the president.

Despite the fact that the consequences of adopting Law No. 122 were obvious
from the moment when the draft law was presented to the Duma, massive
protest actions did not follow in 2004, even though demonstrations of
thousands of people took place in Moscow and a number of other cities
during the summer. But when former recipients felt the full effects of
the abolition of their benefits in the first days of January, they moved
into decisive action.

A demonstration at which the monetisation of benefits featured as one
of the main issues took place on January 9 in Solnechnogorsk, near Moscow.
This action was organised by the local branches of the Communist Party
of the Russian Federation and the Russian Communist Workers Party, communist
youth organisations and other bodies. According to the organisers, about
1500 people took part, in a city with a population of about 60,000. A
similar demonstration took place on the same day in the Moscow suburb
of Mytishchi.

However, people began to speak of a protest movement only after an action
on January 10 in Khimki, on the outskirts of Moscow, at which pensioners
blocked the Leningrad Highway for several hours. This protest was a real
shock, and became the main domestic political news of the day. The governor
of Moscow province, Boris Gromov, threatened to bring criminal charges
against the participants in the demonstration. It is significant that
one of the demands of the demonstrators had been for Khimki to be transferred
from the jurisdiction of Moscow province to that of the city of Moscow.
After the demonstration, reports appeared in the press to the effect that
an agreement had been reached between the city and provincial governments
on the retention of transport benefits in Moscow for residents of the
province. As well as in Khimki, mass demonstrations took place on January
10 in Almetyevsk, a city in Tatarstan of more than 100,000 people, in
Stary Oskop in Belgorod province, in Ufa and in a number of other urban
centres.

Literally within a few days, the protest movement took on a broad scope.
St Petersburg became one of its main centres. On January 14 a demonstration
took place at the Smolny. At 2 pm, Moskovsky Prospekt was blocked near
the Park Pobedy metro station. Then a meeting took place on the corner
of Sadovaya Street and Nevsky Prospekt, blocking traffic at this crowded
hub of urban transport. On January 15 another demonstration was held at
the same place, Nevsky Prospekt again being blocked. Protest actions were
held on January 14 and 15 in several places simultaneously. The result
of the protests was that Governor Valentin Matviyenko agreed to meet with
representatives of the demonstrators on January 17. That day, another
unsanctioned demonstration took place. The first sanctioned demonstration
in St Petersburg took place only on January 25. Further protest actions
were held on January 26 and 29. The authorities responded in contradictory
fashion. On the one hand, they arrested activists and subjected them to
humiliating treatment; ailing pensioners were among those who suffered
in this way. On the other hand, the authorities sought the possibility
of compromise, while refusing to take any serious steps to meet the protesters'
demands. On January 12 and 15 actions were held in Penza, while on January
15 demonstrations took place in numerous cities in Moscow province, including
Krasnogorsk and Balashikha. Another protest occurred in Khimki; although
the television broadcast false reports that this demonstration would not
take place, around 4000 people took part.

In Tyumen on January 17 more than 200 pensioners gathered in front of
the city administration building. On the same day, President Putin addressed
a meeting of the government, laying the blame for the situation in the
country on a few members of his cabinet, who in his view had failed to
ensure that Law No. 122 was implemented in the required fashion.

On January 18 a demonstration took place in Perm, the demonstrators trying
for some time to take the acting governor hostage. Criminal charges were
brought against several of the participants. The protest was repeated
the next day, blocking the road leading to the bridge over the River Kama.
Also on January 19, a protest was held in Vorkuta, demonstrations against
the abolition of benefits also being held between January 17 and 19 in
other urban centres of the Komi Republic.

On January 19 demonstrations took place in Kazan, where Tatarstan Street
was blocked, in Samara, where the Moscow Highway was closed, and in Khabarovsk,
while the action in Perm continued. The largest demonstration was held
in Togliatti, where, according to several accounts, as many as 5000 people
took part. Mass protest actions also occurred on January 19 and 21 in
Izhevsk.

On January 20 a daily picket was continuing in St Petersburg at the Gostiny
Dvor. Protests were also continuing in Samara. In Biysk, in the Altay
region, actions that began on January 20 continued on the 21st. In Orekhovo-Zuyevo
in Moscow province, more than 4000 people attended a demonstration. In
Tula, around 5000 people took part in protest actions organised by the
KPRF, the Russian Union of Pensioners, the Homeland Party and supporters
of Sergey Glazyev. In Novosibirsk, demonstrators closed off the city's
main thoroughfare, Krasny Prospekt.

On January 21 residents of Arkhangelsk came out in a demonstration. Protest
actions also took place in Petropavlovsk- Kamchatsky, in Leningrad province
(Slantsy and Priozersk) and in Irkutsk province (Angarsk and Usole-Sibirskoe).
In Barnaul approximately 10,000 people attended a protest meeting, and
Leninsky Prospekt was blocked.

On January 22 protest actions swept through numerous Russian cities.
The most noteworthy, however, was an action in Moscow, on the square in
front of the Belarus Station. About 5000 people gathered for the demonstration,
organised by the KPRF, Working Russia and several other organisations.
After the meeting a group of members of the communist youth organisations
AKM and SKM tried to make their way to the presidential administration,
but were stopped by the omon riot police. During this clash, eight activists
of the AKM and skm were arrested, including AKM (KPSS [Communist Party
of the Soviet Union) leader Udaltsov. The prisoners were released following
a picket outside the militia station where they were being held. On the
same day, a parallel action was held in Moscow by the National Bolshevik
Party.

On January 23, the next demonstration against the abolition of benefits
went ahead in Kazan. A protest in another Tatarstan city, Naberezhnye
Chelny, was even larger. In Murmansk, the participants in an action organised
by the KPRF and the Pensioners Party demonstrated outside the Kirov Palace
of Culture and then in front of the city administration. According to
the Interior Ministry in the western district of Krasnodar, between 300
and 500 people demonstrated on the same day in the Kuban capital. As reported
by the news agency KPRF-News, a protest action also took place in the
city of Dmitrov in Moscow province. Overall, the protests in the Moscow
region were so numerous that a list of these actions would fill several
pages. At the Dmitrov action, the demonstrators unanimously demanded that
the president resign.

On 25 January, according to the news agency regnum, more than a thousand
people took part in an action in Vladimir. A protest action also took
place the same day in Kovrov, one of the regional centres of Vladimir
province. Protests also continued in the Komi Republic. This time, it
was residents of Syktyvkar who were demonstrating. In neighbouring Kirov
province, a demonstration was held for the first time. As reported by
regnum, the number of demonstrators in Kirov exceeded 3500. Actions were
repeated in Vladimir and Perm. In St Petersburg, as noted earlier, the
first meeting to be sanctioned by the authorities took place on this day.
Residents of Arkhangelsk province and Tomsk came out against the reforms.
In Nizhny Novgorod, according to regnum, more than 4000 people came out
onto the streets. In Kurgan, as reported by the executive committee of
the regional trade union Zashchita- Kurgan, more than 300 former benefit
recipients gathered despite a deep frost to protest against the abolition
of the benefits.

On January 26 residents of Yekaterinburg took part in a protest action.
Demonstrations also occurred in Smolensk and Rostov Veliky. On January
23, an action in Rostov was initiated by the Union of Soviet Officers.
In Voronezh, demonstrators blocked a roadway in the area of Lenin Square.
In Kaliningrad, local students held a protest action. Another demonstration
in defence of social welfare took place in Yakutsk. A road bridge across
the Volga was blocked by participants in a protest in the city of Kimry
in Tver province. According to the local media, more than 3000 people
took part in the action. Numerous demonstrations took place in the Stavropol
territory; the local authorities not only failed to obstruct the protests
but, according to unconfirmed reports, were among the initiators.

On January 27 a demonstration took place in Stavropol itself. Protests
were again held in Perm, Penza, Samara, Vologda, Irkutsk, Yakutsk, Vladimir
and a number of other cities. In Moscow, more than 500 people demonstrated
next to the Lenin Museum. The organisers of this action were the Homeland
Party and the Union of Youth for the Homeland. In Arkhangelsk, a picket
took place as planned. In Omsk, three demonstrations were held simultaneously,
and two roads were blocked. According to the news agency Den, some 350
people demonstrated in the regional centre of Mozhga in the Udmurt Republic.

In Kaliningrad on January 28, as well as a sanctioned protest, an unsanctioned
demonstration was held, with more than 200 pensioners taking part. Alongside
a demonstration in Pskov, a meeting of pensioners and veterans took place.
Demonstrators in Arkhangelsk gave the authorities twelve days in which
to satisfy their demands, or the protests would be renewed. Protest actions
also went ahead in Tomsk, Bratsk, Kaliningrad, Astrakhan, Kirov, Penza
and Kotlas.

On January 29 protest actions were held in St Petersburg, Moscow, Veliky
Novgorod, Astrakhan, Saransk, Bryansk, Ulan-Ude and many other cities.

Although the protest movement is only beginning to flare up, certain
conclusions can already be drawn. First, the authorities did not expect
to encounter such resistance from citizens, and have behaved in a contradictory
and inconsistent manner. While the actions of protesters in some regions
(such as Kaliningrad, Perm, St Petersburg and Moscow) have been met by
the authorities with a stern rebuff, in many other regions the local and
regional authorities have shown solidarity with the demands of the demonstrators.
Dialogue has taken place between participants in the protests and governors,
as for example in Stavropol. In a number of regions, the authorities have
made concessions to the population. Hence in Novosibirsk province, a public
transport ticket will cost ninety roubles instead of 360. In Penza, the
implementation of Law No. 122 has been postponed. The situation is similar
in many other regions. In Udmurtiya, although many of the pensioners'
demands remain unsatisfied, the cost of public transport tickets will
be made up out of the regional budget. In some regions, the lack of such
concessions has moved the population to demand that local authorities
resign. In Ufa, for example, a demonstration adopted the demand for M.
Rakhimov to resign by February 26. Finally, a meeting of the government
of the Russian Federation on Thursday [February 24] resolved to increase
the basic pension for a worker by 240 roubles from March 1, 2005.

From March 1 the basic pension, now 660 roubles, will rise to 900 roubles.
All this indicates that the mass protest actions have had an effect.

Secondly, even though in some regions there has been conflict between
parties and movements (thus in Pskov conflict occurred between anarchists
and a number of veterans' organisations taking national-patriotic positions),
in Russia as a whole representatives of various parties have either acted
jointly, or have not entered into conflict with one another. Quite different
political and social organisations, from anarchists and liberal defenders
of human rights to representatives of the patriotic bloc and radical communist
bodies, have taken up the demand for the reversing of the reforms to the
system of benefits.

Thirdly, virtually all the demonstrators have voiced slogans for the
resignation of the president and government, and for early elections to
the State Duma. It has become clear that concessions on the part of the
authorities will resolve nothing so long as the main problem remains unresolved—that
is, the problem represented by authorities who pursue inadequate socio-economic
policies (and not these alone). Such is the first effort at a chronology
of the protest actions that have been sweeping across Russia since the
beginning of January. The main events, however, still lie ahead.

A. Podrezov

(This text was prepared on the basis of internet materials available
on January 30, 2005.)